Saturday, January 23, 2016

I was going to say that this was the typical case of work/life taking precedence over hobbies. Not a good excuse though, since one can always find bits and pieces of time, like coins between couch cushions :). The best explanation for the long break is probably laziness. But I didn't just loiter around. With my desk full of just-started or half-finished projects screaming for time and attention, how could I? Here are some of the things I re-visited and tried to complete.

1. The Axiris IV-3 clock
As designed by Axiris team, the enclosure for the IV-3 shield can only accommodate one Arduino. The only way to make a real (with RTC) clock is to replace the Arduino with a wdsuino. Then, there is the issue of buttons (or any other way to set the time without using a PC, through USB). I managed to add an extra board that holds two buttons, accessible through the holes on the bottom side of the enclosure.
Below are some pictures.

The sketch I used is included below (based on the sample code from Axiris).

2. WiFiChron1284 edition, featuring ATmega1284 SMD
This should be the "ultimate" upgrade for the WiFiChron board. The ATmega1284 processor will provide extra room for the ESP8266 WiFi code (debugging, parsing RSS feeds, data buffering etc).
The PCB design of the new board is shown below. (The boards are ordered and being manufactured).

3. Adapter for dual HDSP display
This adapter, suggested by Ray S, is the new addition to the collection of adapters developed for HDSP clock or WiFiChron.
Combined with the above mentioned WiFiChron1284, it would make a miniature Wise Clock 4 (without the SD card though). The two HDSP-2534 displays share all signals except for the CE (chip enable). The second display uses pin 10 for CE. Writing to each display is done by enabling the right CE line. This allows independent control of each display (dimming, text scrolling etc.).